Fez, Meknes, Moulay Idriss (and Volubilis)..oh my!

After our 8 hour bus ride, we arrived in Fez bright and early on Sunday morning. We were all a little scatter brained and drowsy from the long bus trip so we headed inside the train station to freshen up. There wasn’t any toilet paper (of course), but there were toilets and running water (and SOAP!!). We spent about 30 minutes in the bathroom just changing clothes, brushing teeth, washing our faces, etc. The bathroom attendants were hardcore judging us (but not as much as when we started practicing our belly dancing routine a few nights later in the same bathroom…).

After we felt a little better, we emerged from the train station and were greeted by the lovely city of Fez! Several taxi drivers approached us but at this point we were starting to get the hang out it so we just walked right past them and entered into a little coffee shop to get some breakfast. We ordered mint tea and croissants (yum). The croissants were sticky and some of the sugar got stuck all over my teeth-I thought I was going to have to find a dentist-but it all worked out!

We walked around the city a little bit and I guess we looked lost because one guy gave us his number “just in case” and then proceeded to follow us across town to “warn us that we were walking towards a dangerous neighborhood”. Yeah, ok.

We were supposed to meet our couch surfer at the McDonalds at about 9:30-so we found the McDonalds and were chilling there for awhile (he said he would be there in 5 minutes-I think Moroccan time is similar to French time).

Side note for everyone who is unfamiliar with couch surfing: It is a fabulous website where you can find people in a region that you are traveling to and if they are available they will host you on their couch for a few nights and show you around their city. It’s an incredible invention and because of it we only had to pay for two nights in hostels our whole trip!

This was my first experience with couch surfing-so we were all a little anxious as we waited the arrival of “Loukman”. I was joking about how he was going to pull up on his little scooter and try to pile all of us on: and then he pulled up on his little scooter and tried to pile all of us on. Just kidding, kind of. He did pull up in his scooter but then he called a taxi for three of us and Caitlin rode on the back of his scooter. It was pretty sketchy-but we’re young and fun, so we went with the flow (this motto was necessary for pretty much the rest of the trip-especially regarding Loukman and his friends).

We arrived at his apartment and were greeted by 3 of his friends, all who appeared to be very nice guys. They showed us to our room and we sat down our stuff and they started making breakfast for us. We were all so tired from two nights of less than ideal sleep so we hung out on the couch and chatted with them while they cooked. We ate and were very grateful. After brunch they sang us a few songs (just go with it). We laughed initially but then realized they were serious. We then played some name games and other activities that I did in 4^th grade. They all seemed to be having so much fun that it was hard to break into the conversation and tell them we wanted to explore Fez!

They escorted us around the city and we were so thankful because one of their friends owned this absolutely stunning riad in the middle of town and they gave us a tour of it, and THEN one of the guy’s cousins was building a traditional riad so we got a tour of the building process also! Riads are so amazing and the amount of detailed work that goes into them is so incredible. It’s been decided that I want to live in one when I grow up and become a big girl.

We played games in a pretty park. There were two teams and they would say a number in Arabic (it’s like we were studying!) and if that was your number you had to try to run across the line without getting tagged. It was fun for the first few rounds but then we were more than ready to continue exploring the city.

They took us through a souk and got us some sweet deals (because they are locals) and also were so generous and would buy us random things that we mentioned we needed (toothbrush, coffee, etc).

While walking through the souk, we entered a leather shop and our friends spoke with the owner and then they led us upstairs and handed us mint leaves. I knew from reading guidebooks that the tanneries are actually located in the middle of the medina and you can access them from the leather shops. Most of the time though you are pretty much required to buy something if they give you a tour of the tannery. It was really interesting and pretty gross at the same time. I was thankful for my mint leaf. And since we were with the locals, we didn’t have to buy anything, but got a tour (sweet!).

We took a cab home and they sang if you’re happy and you know it (in Arabic) the whole way home. We giggled and took pictures with a fez (the hat). When we arrived back at the house they sang us a welcome couch surfing song to the song “Waka Waka” by Shakira. They put our names in it, then they played a broken guitar that they explained was sat on by a fat Algerian man. We didn’t ask questions. They brought us lunch (lots and lots of French fries-and sandwiches).

Then we told them that we wanted to go to a hammam. They weren’t all that thrilled because I think they just wanted to sing with us the whole night, but they suggested a “great local” one and said they would drive us. Thea had researched a traditional, beautiful, UNESCO hammam, but we didn’t want to argue. We gathered our shower stuff (because this would be our first bath of the trip-thrilling!) and headed to the hammam in one of the guys cars.

They dropped us off and talked (and tipped) the ladies for us and told us they would be back in a couple hours to pick us up.

We entered the hammam and went upstairs to undress. Some ladies followed us up there and took all of our stuff and started shoving it into one small bag while simultaneously yelling at us in darija (the Moroccan dialect).  They then started pulling us down the stairs and into this big room FILLED with women, children, teens, and sheep (just kidding). Right when we walked in we knew there was going to be trouble.  Every single face in the whole room whipped in our direction and followed us as we walked to the back corner and sat down. The room was really warm and we all took our hot buckets of water and started bathing ourselves. Not long after, a large woman (I think it’s repetitious to say she was naked-but in case you missed that-she was) came over and sat next to me and started pulling me over to her and scrubbing my body with one of those loofa things. She scrubbed and scrubbed until my skin started to fall off and then she tapped me and pointed to the skin and made a proud face. I was thinking “oh yeah, great. You managed to rip all my skin off. Great”. She pulled limb after limb trying to get me to turn over or move a few inches. She didn’t speak a word of French or English so communication was left to her just moving my body in whatever way she needed in order to best scrub all my skin off. After about 6 hours of this torture that was supposed to be “relaxing” she started dumping buckets of hot water onto my head and stealing some other ladies shampoo to wash my hair. She then ripped all of my hair out trying to brush it and then pulled it TIGHTLY into a braid and moved onto the next person.

I was let sitting there, alone (except for everyone staring at me), feeling like a naked mole rat.

Luckily for me, they had a latrine! So I did the walk of shame and crossed the floor to use it.

I returned and I was pretty ready to leave, but big breasted lady was still scrubbing all the skin off of my friends, so I sat in a corner and tried to drink one of the soda’s that the guys had given us but unfortunately when big breasted lady poured the water over my head a lot of it splashed into the can-hence giving it the title of “undrinkable”.

After searching for our clothes (this was a hard process with our limited Arabic and their limited French), we headed home and tried to hit the hay but were forced to sit through a few more songs and a few more salsa dances before the lights were finally shut off.

The next morning we got up bright and early and headed to Meknes (with all 4 of the guys escorting us to the train station). Mom you may want to skip this part if you have successfully managed to make it this far in the blog. Dude! Best part ever! I rode on the back of a little scooter to the train station! We weaved in and out of traffic at about 100MPH and squeezed between cars as they changed lanes!  I thought I was going to die for sure, but I didn’t J

The city of Meknes is so lovely and there are actually rolling, green hills, which I didn’t expect at all. We walked through a souk and people actually stuck their hands in our pockets! It was a crazy experience. Well not actually my pockets because I was wearing a dress over my jeans, but still. It was creepy how people would walk by multiple times and stare at our purses. #reallife While in Meknes we also took a tour of an underground prison (that's no longer in use). It was huge and cold and dark and eery and right above it there used to be a beautiful garden where the ambassadors from different countries would come to negotiate the terms of getting their prisoners released. The irony was that they didn't realize that their prisoners were standing right under their feet!

Moulay Idriss

We then took a cab up to Volubilis and Moulay Idriss which are ancient roman ruins and a little city on a hill (respectively). The cab ride was so beautiful and both places were incredibly breathtaking and historical!

We took the train back to Fez that night (after buying a drum in the souk for our couch surfing friends). We arrived and gave them our drum and (of course) they spent the rest of the night singing and drumming until we told them we were extremely exhausted. Nonetheless, they went out and brought us dinner at 2am while we were tucked into bed J